


AU ~ Atlas' Universe

by blueberrysebby



Category: Real Person Fiction
Genre: AU, AU - Atlas' Universe, Christopher Eccleston RPF, Crack, F/F, F/M, Gen, Innuendo, M/M, Mark Gatiss RPF - Freeform, Michael Sheen RPF, Mild Language, Multi, No Smut, Other, anygays happy birthday, don't even try to understand some stuff please, everybody is y/n, it's just supposed to be fun, it's literally chaos, just a bunch of friends meeting their celebrity crushes, lots of RPF in general, the world is fun for once, there is zero realism in here don't judge me, this is a birthday gift for a friend so there's lots of inside jokes, this was born from a group chat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 07:09:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26349130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueberrysebby/pseuds/blueberrysebby
Summary: An alternate universe where everything isn’t shit. A bundle of friends meet their celebrity crushes. And suddenly, everyone is Y/N.
Kudos: 4





	AU ~ Atlas' Universe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PeverellSlytherin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeverellSlytherin/gifts).



Picture this:

The year is 2022. The place is London. London Comic Con. The door to Hall D swings open and everyone – well, almost everyone, excluding a bunch of furries in a corner currently trying to fan each other a little further away from the edge of a heatstroke while also barely being able to see in their suits – turns their heads and utter silence falls. Excluding a hyperventilating furry, but never mind that. It fits the general atmosphere, actually. The intro of “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!” starts running somewhere in the distance for some inexplicable reason, as in walks…a man. _The_ man. Black, riveted leather jacket, sunglasses despite the gloomy weather outside, grey chinos, black oxfords, his quiff blown into perfect shape by the autumn squalls, his chestnut designer stubble glistening with silver raindrops. Suddenly the furries aren’t the only ones fighting hyperventilation; a group of Tennant fangirls have suddenly forgotten the Tenth Doctor. Then, the door closes, the man takes off his sunglasses, and with one glance around the room with his piercing blue eyes the spell is broken. Everyone goes back to their respective businesses, as though nothing had ever happened, memories erased. The man effortlessly makes his way through the crowd.

This is Atlas.

And he’s just here to meet a couple of friends.

As usually, he’s the last one to arrive. Not because he’s tardy, no. Simply because the party only starts when he walks in. As we have just witnessed.

And this party starts at the vending machine in Hall D, where they’ve agreed to meet. The first one of them who was there to begin a rather personal struggle with said vending machine is a lumberjack-looking young hunk with a beard that might as well have a life of its own – he let it grow out to compete with that of a certain Michael Sheen, except that he couldn’t withstand the temptation and dyed it bright blue in tune with his head hair two nights ago. Nobody said a man couldn’t be an overthinker and impulsive at the same time, and so Miles had chosen to be both. Eventually, he was joined by a couple, her dressed up as a fish, him as a slug – Jakota and Jakota. To simplify, we’ll call them Fish Jakota and Slug Jakota henceforth. They were the only ones of the group who really blended in at the Con, and they’d already been at a Daredevil panel together. The fourth member of their group to arrive hadn’t been hard to discover – she seemed to have a personal soundtrack wherever she went – in this case it was St. John’s “Roses” – , looked like a billionaire in her white pant suit and wide-brimmed hat, her golden mascara making her dark skin and her eyes glow. People made a lane for her to walk through, and she turned every head – apart from those of Miles, Jakota and Jakota. Except perhaps in recognition, when she arrived at the vending machine.

“Eva!” Miles removed his hand from the ejection slot and attacked her with a bear hug. Jakota and Jakota – although Slug Jakota barely knew her – followed suit.

“Baby – where’s Julia?” was the first thing Eva asked the muscle-packed, blue-bearded Miles.

“Mum’s at the Harry Potter autograph table, flirting with pretty much everyone”, Miles drawled midwesterly.

“Irresponsible, to leave you alone here, my child”, Eva teased. “You could get lost.”

“If anything, I’m close to hulk-smashing this vending machine. I want a KitKat.”

“What’s the problem?”

“Not enough change.”

Eva produced a handful of banknotes from her décolleté and handed them to Miles.

“Round’s on me.”

However, they didn’t have long to chatter.

Somewhere, “Sexy And I Know It” started playing, and again, the crowd split like the Red Sea, and at the other end of the lane, a young man appeared who was an 80s/90s fused fashion miracle. White fringy flared jeans, a silver-sequined crop top and a metallic grey spiked choker, he cat-walked his way through the crowd and stopped in front of his four friends with a little curtsy.

“LG!”

A group hug ensued.

“Where are the others?”

“Well”, a low voice came from a corner behind the vending machine, “I’ve been here quite a while myself.” A shape in a grey hoodie stepped out, threw off the hood to reveal his Thor-like tousled long hair and stubbly beard. “I’m the narrator, I can’t be too present.”

“Seb, what the fuck?! How long have you been there?” LG asked suspiciously.

“Who knows…” Seb grinned evilly. “Lucky you came, Eva, Miles really was about to destroy that machine.”

“You could’ve helped me!” Miles pouted.

“No money.”

“Do you actually not have money or are you just quoting Nine?”

Seb just shrugged in response. Miles meanwhile had finally extracted several KitKats from the machine and handed them round, being met with grateful, happy nods from everyone except Seb.

“Bitch seriously?” Seb crossed his arms. “That stuff’s _not_ vegan. Plus I don’t eat Nestlé shit.” He whirled a little braid from his (long) face. “’s alright”, he suddenly broke into a smile, “I’m not hungry anyway.”

“Bro”, was all Miles had to say to that.

“Now we’re only waiting for Atlas”, moaned LG. “As always.”

“Shut up, bottom.” And that – that’s him. Atlas had crept up on them and now jump-hugs Miles and Seb before moving on to Eva and the two Jakotas. LG steps back in fake outrage.

“Not a bottom!” he pouts.

“Silence”, laughs Atlas before throwing his arms around him too. “Alright. Now that I’m here – time to go, huh?”

“I am _so_ not ready”, sighs LG.

“Neither am I, believe me y’all.” Miles bites heartily into his KitKat.

“I still can’t believe we’re even all here”, admits Seb. The others just nod in agreement.

“Anygays let’s walk”, Eva suggests and goes ahead. Seb stays behind a bit because he has to slap himself in the corner behind the vending machine. He can’t even properly write first encounters of internet friends. Although it’s never too late to try. It would probably be all like:

“OMG!!!!” 

“ATLAAAS!”

“BIRTHDAY BOYYY!”

“LG THAT CROP TOP AAAA!”

“EVAAA! YOU LOOK SO GOOD! PLEASE DON’T SLAP ME WITH THAT HAT THOUGH!”

“Damn there are no irl reaction emojis fuck. Never mind now I can finally simply flip you off.”

“JAKOTA! JAKOTA! YOU’RE SO CUTE TOGETHER WHAT THE FUUUCK?”

“MILESY YOUR BEARD! CHOKE ME WITH IT!”

“IF ANYONE CHOKES ANYONE WITH ANYTHING HERE IT’S ME!” (side: that’s Atlas.)

“HOW WERE YOUR JOURNEYS? MY PLANE HAD A TWO-HOUR DELAY I WAS SO SCARED I WASN’T GONNA MAKE IT HHHHH!”

“ANYWAY CAN’T BELIEVE WE’LL MEET MICHAEL!”

“AND MARK!” (Mischievous Atlas smirk here.)

“And…Chris *muffled Seb noises*.”

“JAKOTA HOW WAS YOUR DAREDEVIL PANEL?”

“I…I’m not actually as excited about seeing Michael as I am about-“ (-that’s Eva-)

“…seeing US?! I KNOW RIGHT??!!!”

“I meant-“

“AND LG NOT A **WORD** ABOUT MICHAEL’S ARMPITS.” (Threatening stare from Atlas.)

“LEAVE ME ALOOONE! YOU KNOW I WON’T…” (Sanctimonious LG smile.)

“THE THING STARTS IN FIVE LET’S FUCKING GOOO!”

…or something like this. Anyway, it's Atlas' birthday, and they’re on the way to Hall F, where all the autograph tables are.

“I was gonna say something different by the way”, Eva remarks on the way. “Sure I’m more excited about meeting y’all than anyone else but…maybe I forgot to tell you there’s more Marvel people here than the Daredevil guys, Jakota and I talked…”

“Wh- who’s here then that we should, umm, know about?” Miles pokes with an eyebrow wiggle.

“Just perhaps…no, actually quite certainly…Angela Bassett and Winston Duke.” Eva smirks.

“Dayum.” That’s LG.

“So I might drop you off at the Michael Sheen table and meet you again later…?” Eva shrugs with a happy little wiggle.

They do indeed part when they arrive in the vicinity of Michael Sheen’s table. Eva as well as the Jakotas are fine with just seeing him from a distance for now – they’re more eager to get to the Marvel table – “Ben Barnes is there, too!” Fish Jakota smiles, upon which Slug Jakota gives a mildly worried wince – so that’s where they’re off to.

“I so want to bury my nose in his chest hair”, Miles mumbles as they get in the autograph queue.

“Saaame”, LG sighs, nervously brushing through the sequins of his top. “I want to smell his armpits.”

They’re in line for what could almost be called the BBC table. Although at least one person behind the table would hate for it to be called that, probably – nervous side eye at Mr Eccleston.

There’s him, Michael Sheen and Mark Gatiss. They’re doing autographs right now, but they’ll be doing photo ops too, later, so they’re certainly going to have several déjà-vu moments, not only with Atlas, LG, Miles and Seb. Who are getting closer to the table by the minute. They’re mostly very jittery and feeling mildly to uncomfortably nauseous at this point.

“I can’t do this”, Seb wheezes once after several minutes of trying to get his pulse below 120 bpm.

“Oh come on”, says Atlas, the only one of them who seems kind of composed. “You waited years for this.”

“Exactly”, Seb grins with a tortured face, “I could easily wait some more.”

“You wanted nothing more than to hug him all the time.”

“That’s exactly the problem.”

“You won’t even get to hug him yet though!”

“That’s even worse. I have to make…intelligent conversation?! How?”

“Mood”, mutters Miles. LG just nods miserably. Suddenly they’re all keenly aware of the saying ‘never meet your heroes’ – but in this case, less because they might be disappointed and more because they might die of heart failure in the process.

Seb has flashbacks of the dream he once had of Chris chasing him around a haunted house with a brick for laughing at the wrong parts of his book. LG and Miles are busy peering around the shoulders of other people. Atlas has his eyes set firmly on his man of interest, unwavering.

And suddenly, there are no more shoulders to peer around. They’re there. The three men are arranged in such an order that they pass Michael first and can then move on to Mark and further to Chris. LG has pudding knees and half clings to Miles, half shoves him in front of him, so Miles has no choice but to go first.

“Hellooo”, Michael, sporting a thick beard, untamed curls and one of his two dozen grey v necks, launches his usual greeting at the young man.

“Hii”, Miles croaks back. “I, um…”

“I think I’ve seen you before! Twitter?” Michael smiles endearingly. Miles just swallows and nods.

“I- you remember my face?! Holy ravioli…”

“I remember all of you”, Michael begins and they think he’s about to slip into wholesomeness when he continues, “from watching you sleep from the depths of the darkness of the corner of your room.” His smile turns demonic for a split second before fluidly returning to ‘your friendly neighbourhood lumberjack sheep’. But it works wonders. Miles’ laugh is suddenly relieved; these she(e)nanigans aren’t that different from Twitter, and somehow that’s reassuring.

“Impressive beard you’ve got there by the way, Sir.”

Miles is tearing up. “That’s something I’ve thought a lot about you, Sir, but would never have believed _you’d_ say to _me_. Your beard has certainly been my main inspiration.” And, suddenly feeling daring, he adds: “I still need to work on the chest hair, though.”

“Perhaps don’t – I’ve colonies of imps living in mine. They creep into my ears and make me feral.”

That somehow encourages LG (maybe it was simply the mention of chest hair, though).

“I don’t think that’s the imps, Sir”, he pipes up from half behind Miles, stepping forward just enough for Michael to see him.

“How _dare_ you!” Michael rumbles in his deepest Welsh accent, teasingly wagging his finger at LG, then immediately breaks into a wide smile. “That is a _great_ top you’ve got there. I want one. I’m gonna ask Anna for one for my birthday, I think.”

“You’d look gorgeous in it”, agrees LG, “especially-“ Miles, Atlas and Seb collectively hold their breaths, heart rates skyrocketing, “-your arms.” Close save. LG stops and smiles impishly, making sure that the whole gang can see it. They all let out one big, silent sigh of relief.

“Oh, thank you, Mister.” Michael nods in mock earnestness. “Appreciate it. Seen as I’ve had them so diligently filled with Nutella.”

Atlas and Seb both bury their faces in their hands behind Miles and LG, while the latter two just turn cherry red and start giggling uncontrollably. Michael then asks for their names and autographs the things they brought (LG brought a shirt, Miles decided to have the backside of his Aziraphale bow tie autographed, which earns him an adorable “aww” from Michael), and they move aside and on, making room for Seb and Atlas, who both love Michael, but have their minds too bent on the men down the table, respectively, to linger much longer than to say a few words of thanks and get autographs.

They move on. And then – there he is. Mark Gatiss, in all his all his 6’1’’ glory, dark grey suit, pearl white shirt, a mesmerising, shimmering light purple tie and ginger stubble. Atlas feels like he’s been punched. He wants to punch back.

“Afternoon, Sir”, he rasps, between trying to sound sexy and trying to remain conscious. “That’s a gorgeous tie.”

“Oh, thank you”, Mark beams up at him, and Atlas can see several constellations in his blue eyes. “Looking not too bad yourself!” He appreciatively gazes down Atlas' leather-jacketed torso. “Is that cosplay or just your own sexy?”

Inside Atlas' brain, everything comes to a grinding halt, but he somehow manages to stay smooth as an eel. “Mustered up all of my own – couldn’t let you have all of the sexy, now could I?”

There’s a moment that nobody witnesses except Seb, who, however, is a bit lost in his own apprehensions, when the air between Atlas and Mark is as thick as birthday cake batter and as tense as the fabric of Mark’s shirt across his chest. “It’s my birthday after all”, Atlas adds to somehow break that tension before it would tempt him to just launch forward and-

“Congratulations! Well, that requires an especially nice…”, Mark begins, while exactly at that moment, Atlas slips the photo in front of him that he wants signed. It’s a more or less tasteful near-nude of Mark. “…birthday sui-, um…autograph, right?”

Atlas doesn’t know if he’s hallucinating or not at this point, but he believes to hear a distinct tremor in Mark’s voice, and his eyes flicker, between Atlas and the photo, he would, if he didn’t know better, say, almost nervously. “What’s the name, then, Sir?”

“Atlas”, he replies, his voice sounding a bit gruffer than intended. Mark pops his marker open and writes ‘the happiest of birthdays to Atlas – Mark Gatiss’ across his photo self’s back and – draws a little heart exactly around his apple-shaped bum. Atlas doesn’t know how, but somehow he manages to not let his jaw drop onto the table; instead he very pointedly bites his lip while looking Mark square in the eye, thanks him, and moves on – not noticing the hole into which he leaves Mark staring for a few seconds until the next person in line obstructs his sudden daydreams. Daydreams that are quite lucky for Seb, who manages to just slip past Mark without seeming rude – he doesn’t have anything against him, he’s just way too busy at the moment to focus on anything besides the nitty-gritty – which, in this case, is now right in front of him all of a sudden, gazing at him alarmingly bluely.

“Hi”, says Chris, and Seb turns around instinctively, but there’s no one else he could be talking to. _Fuck._

“Uh, hi.” Brain empty, no thoughts. At all. “I, um…” Suddenly, Seb remembers and hauls, almost _slaps_ , an envelope on the table in front of Chris. Who is about to open his pen and sign when Seb finally rediscovers language.

“Eh, no, I- that’s for you. Sorry. It’s just – wanted to tell you some stuff that’s too much for right here across the table.” Seb breathes, and notices how the last part of that sentence sounded, and hopes that Chris didn’t notice, and looks at him, and can’t for the death of him read his face, and-

“Thanks. I’ll make sure to read it.” He smiles vaguely up at Seb and Seb’s heart sinks for some reason.

“Thank you so much. If it’s stupid, just stop reading, please?” His voice cracks and abandons him until he harrumphs uncomfortably. “’s just…you’ve helped me a lot. And you mean a lot to me. Uh, anyway – signing…stuff.” He reaches into his large jacket pockets and produces not one, but two books: one copy of Chris’ autobiography, and one of ‘Macbeth’.

“I couldn’t decide, because I love your book, but I also love your Macbeth, and you love Macbeth, and I…never mind, I thought I’d just ask you to sign what you prefer…I hope that’s okay…”

“Mind if I-“ Chris reaches for both of the books, opens the biography and asks, “what’s your name then?”

“Sebastian”, Seb blurts out. Chris turns toward the book, and Seb looks away so as not to pressure him. His whole body is trembling and sweating icily. He zones out so much, he almost gets a heart attack when Chris boops his hand to signal that he’s done. Seb shoots around in shock and stares at Chris for a highly embarrassing second before grabbing the books, wanting to run and grow roots at the same time.

“Wait, did you-“

“Looking forward to reading the letter”, Chris smirks cheekily up to him, and for a moment, Seb forgets how to breathe. Chris just stares back at him until a tug at his arm reminds Seb of reality. That’s Atlas.

“Come on, you lovelorn dumbass”, he hisses at Seb, pulling him away.

“Thanks, Sir”, is all Seb can still say, then they're out of earshot. “Atlas – why? Also _you_ dare call _me_ a lovelorn dumbass?! The audacity!” Seb grumpily comes to a standstill and looks into his books. The autobiography has a regular autograph: ‘To Sebastian – Christopher Eccleston’. But then he opens ‘Macbeth’ – to find a ‘What, you egg?’ and a stabby dagger pointed in the direction of whoever is reading, and under it, tiny, another signature. Seb giggles, but also feels himself welling up at an alarming rate.

“Let’s find the others”, he mumbles, very quietly, to avoid sobbing out loud. Atlas grabs his sleeve and pulls him along.

They do find the others, back at the vending machine. Eva and Fish Jakota are glowing, and Slug Jakota looks pretty happy, too.

“They preponed the photo op”, Eva is grinning from one ear to the other and holds up a photo. “Look.” In the photo, she’s standing between Winston Duke and Angela Bassett, who are both making the ‘Wakanda Forever’ pose. Jakota and Jakota have a photo of them recreating the Distracted Boyfriend Meme with Ben Barnes. LG is constantly nuzzling the shirt Michael signed, and Miles is clinging to the bow tie as though his life depended on it.

“I can’t wait for Farris to see these”, says Eva. “I’m still mad at her boss for not giving her a day off.”

“But at least we get to go to Wales like that”, Miles has them consider. Atlas meanwhile has let go of Seb and is now staring at his photo.

“Seb”, he mutters, “you were there. Did Mark- I mean, did he like…”

“Flirt?! Yup. Definitely, Sir.”

“He _what_?!” exclaims Eva.

“He grew all nervous and sweaty around Atlas. They had some heavy verbal petting going on there. Half a minute longer and they’d have had desk sex.” Seb chuckles.

“Shut _up_ ”, Atlas slaps half-heartedly in Seb’s direction, but he can’t help but grin and giggle and bounce on his heels.

They use the following hour or so to recover, before the photo ops with Michael, Mark and Chris start. LG and Miles both keep losing their shit every other minute over getting to feel the famous sookness of Michael Sheen in person at last.

“I’m just gonna shrink and burrow in his chest hair”, Miles resolves.

“Same. But I’m gonna climb down to his-“

“I dare you to say one more word”, mumbles Atlas, half laughing, half despairing.

“Oooh keep your top-ness for Mark, man”, LG teases him, and Atlas facepalms.

“Mycroft give me strength”, he mutters under his breath.

The Jakotas are standing by, sharing an ice cream cone, while Eva has gotten herself a huge, freshly made green smoothie that she’s rapidly downing for lunch. Atlas, Miles, LG and Seb aren’t hungry. Eating is currently the last thing they can think of. Seb has the complexion of a mouldy book, the shadows under his eyes like old ink stains.

“I survived him once”, he sighs, “I won’t have that luck a second time. He’s just gonna kill me.”

“Give me _one_ reason for why he should kill you”, Eva requests calmly while suckling on her smoothie.

“I’m annoying and embarrassing and dumb.”

“Seb, we all are”, says Atlas.

“Hot take”, Eva interrupts, “you’re all _not_. You’re all very attractive, very intelligent young men and you should take pride in that.”

“I’m just a gay mess honestly”, Miles whines, nervously twisting an end of his moustache.

“Mood”, says LG.

Luckily there isn’t much more time for them to despair. The game is on.

Michael’s op is first. And Miles is one of the first ones in line.

“Miles and Michaelll!” Michael almost _exclaims_ to greet him, using his ‘Jack – the Tree Spirit’ voice. “Introducing the greatest beards in the galaxy!”

And Miles lets his restraints go and runs to hug him – bear hug to bear hug. The photo becomes one of the softest, squishiest photos in existence.

“How did he smell?” LG wiggles his hands nervously.

“Just go smell for yourself, freak”, Miles laughs while feeling like he’d inhaled several litres of helium. “Can I just have this every day please?!”

LG actually gets Michael to take him into a headlock, and LG comes back with a very unique photo and revelling in the experience of Michael’s ‘musk’, as he calls it, very much to the displeasure of the rest of the group.

“Now I just need to find out if all of his body smells like this”, he smirks, mischievously twiddling his thumbs.

Atlas is up next for Mark’s op. He’s gained so much confidence at this point, he isn’t even nervous anymore. He basically struts up to Mark, very clear about what he wants.

“Hi again”, Mark greets him.

“Hey”, Atlas smirks, licking his lips. “Can you get on your knees and pretty much…pretend to propose?”

“Mh, uh, sure”, Mark replies, suddenly sounding a bit muffled, and gets to it at once. Atlas takes his hands into one of his own, while placing the one away from the camera on Mark’s head.

From the perspective of any outsider it looks completely harmless, but between them, the tension is almost unbearable. Mark leans the tiniest bit into Atlas' hand, just enough for Atlas to notice it very clearly nevertheless – and the look Mark is giving him is very, _very_ unambiguous, almost brazen. In the act of getting back up, Mark leans closer to Atlas and blocks the view from the camera for just a second, which he uses to stick a shred of paper into Atlas' chest pocket, then letting him go with a last heated gaze and a very suggestive lip lick.

“Bye”, Atlas mumbles, reluctantly.

“Laters”, is all Mark replies before smiling at the queue to welcome the next in line.

Atlas fetches his photo, pretends to calmly swagger away – until he’s definitely out of sight. Then, he’s never run as fast in his whole life. When he gets back to the rest of the group, he’s completely winded for several reasons.

“Oh. My. Fucking. God.” He stands still in their middle, and before anyone can ask anything, he hands them the photo and digs into his chest pocket. He unfolds the snippet and suddenly starts coughing hard, his eyes popping from his skull, until Miles and Seb both give him a hard slap on the back simultaneously.

“What’s that?” Eva asks with raised eyebrows.

“Yeah, show, Atlas”, Fish Jakota teases him.

Atlas just looks around, at each of them, like in a trance, clenching the paper in his fist.

“What _is it_ , Atlas?!” LG grouches, and finally, Atlas resurfaces.

“’Atlas – Ian and I eat at the Ritz tonight, 7:30. Join us, if you like. Come alone. Mark X’”, he reads out.

For a good minute, none of them says anything. Then:

“What?!” Eva is the first to find her voice again. “Excuse _me_?! Hoooly shit Atlas!”

“That’s-“ is all LG has to say – the rest are still completely mute. Until:

“Looks like someone’s gonna have birthday sex tonight, huh?!” That’s Miles. He looks, to put it mildly, impressed.

“Dang Atlas”, remarks LG, “you have no idea how envious I am right now.”

“Of getting to fuck Mark and Ian?” Atlas chuckles darkly.

“Nooo! Of getting to…well, I want that with Michael!” LG pouts.

“Day’s not over”, sighs Seb. He looks and sounds defeated and deflated. “It’s time Atlas gets laid though. I don’t think he could bear the envelope much longer alone.”

They all laugh, but they’re still in awe. Very much so. And the awed chatter continues until it’s time for the last op, and Seb. Then he walks away like he was on death row.

“Hiya.”

“Hi – again.” Chris smiles so fondly at him Seb wants to melt into a puddle at his feet. “How do you want me?”

Seb gawks at him, scandalised, before realising he means for the photo.

“Um, can we do the Banquo ghost scene? Where you reach across the table and-“

“I know the one. Sure.” Chris gets into position and Seb rather awkwardly reaches out to touch his cheek, and Chris reaches back. They try to look shocked at each other - which certainly isn’t a great acting feat for Seb - until the camera flashes. Then, Chris’ shocked expression melts back into a smile and Seb believes he can feel his thumb brushing across his stubbly cheek, which is turned away from the camera.

“Hey – I read your letter.”

“Oh god.” Seb wants to vanish into the void.

“Thanks for…all that. You wanna…talk about it somewhere else?”

“Like where?”

“Bank of the Thames, tonight?”

“Next!” someone screams.

“Wh- you’re taking the piss.”

“I’m most certainly not. London Eye, eight pm?”

“I- yeah. Sure.” Seb is too bamboozled to say anything else. Although there was one very important thing-

“Can I hug you?”

“Sure you can – tonight.” And Chris sends Seb off with something that looks almost like a wink, but trying to be secretive, and his tongue poking out.

Seb gets his photo – and runs.

“Guys”, is all he gets out when he gets back.

“How was it? See, he didn’t kill you!” Eva banters. “We decided we’ll _all_ dine at the Ritz tonight – at a safe distance from Atlas and his twink husbands that is, of course.”

“I-“, Seb makes a muffled noise, ready to take flight right from where he’s standing. “Guess what…I’m afraid it’s _beaus before bros_ not just for Atlas tonight.”

As it turns out, they and the Gatiss/Hallard husbands weren’t the only ones who had decided to dine at the Ritz tonight. When they discover Michael Sheen’s face among in the dining crowd, they aren’t even surprised. They are, however, when they discover that he’s out eating with none other than his partner Anna as well as David and Georgia Tennant, who hadn’t even been at the Con today but obviously live in London. Seb had already left his ‘fam’ around 7 and gone on his way to meet Chris in a rather more rugged environment, secretly glad to escape the Ritz, while Atlas had made for the restaurant half an hour before them. When the rest of them arrive, they see him in the distance, in a very intimate little corner, with Mark and Ian.

The Sheen/Lundberg/Tennant conglomerate is seated closer to them, more towards the centre of the huge dining room, already enjoying their dessert – one gigantic shared chocolate fountain, Miles finds out when peering over not quite as inconspicuously as he had planned – and catches Michael’s eye. Which lingers on him, winks – and then quickly returns to his table companions. Miles already deems himself safe when a sudden silence spreads across his table – and he notices that Michael has crept up on him, or rather on them all, from behind Miles’ back.

“Hallo friends”, he rumbles. “Hope I’m not interrupting. Just wanted to pop in to say, we’re gonna move over to the bar in a bit. You’re all very welcome to join us, if you want. I’ve heard there might be some more Con guests from earlier as well. So, uh – see you later, eh?”

And he pops off again before any of them can reply. A heated discussion ensues, although they basically all hold the same position – of course they’d accept the invitation. While they’re eating, they keep exchanging knowing glances with the Sheen/Lundberg/Tennant table, until the occupants of the latter indeed move on to the bar area, and out of sight.

As much as they all enjoy their meals – it can’t be denied that they are all eating rather more hurriedly than they might have done under usual circumstances.

However, before they are done, they notice Atlas and his two companions leaving the restaurant – and heading over to the bar as well.

When Eva, LG, Miles and the Jakotas are finally done eating, they’re worried the others might already have left – but there’s no reason for concern. They find the others still in the bar – and not just them. Mr Duke and Mrs Bassett are there as well.

“What’d Seb say about beaus before bros?” Eva waggles her eyebrows suggestively. “I’m afraid I have to leave y’all for tonight. See you in the morning.”

She crosses paths with Michael, who is just walking up to the remaining four, introduces himself to the Jakotas, and then turns to LG and Miles.

“I told David and the girls about you. They’d like to meet you. Wanna come?”

LG looks like he’s imploding when Michael holds one hand out to him, the other to Miles, to help them gentlemanly from their bar stools and lead them very suavely over to his companions.

Jakota – formerly Fish Jakota, who is now wearing a very smart pant suit – gazes around the bar, now alone with (formerly Slug) Jakota, who is now in a suit and a stunning pink shirt.

“Darling”, she whispers into his ear, “don’t look now, but…I think over there’s Ben Barnes.”

Pink Shirt Jakota is alarmed and – of course – does look at once. No one’s there.

“Kiddinggg”, his girlfriend snickers. “Come, let’s get drinks and hide in a corner – beaus before bros, remember?”

Suddenly, Pink Shirt Jakota looks much more content.

Nobody notices the two figures that walk past outside around 11:17, hand in hand, having just taken a stroll from the London Eye to and through St James’s Park.

Especially not Atlas, who is huddled in a corner on an old dark turquoise velvet sofa, one hand on Ian’s knee under the low table. The other is currently busy ever so slightly pulling Mark closer into their kiss.

~THE END~


End file.
